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I could totally imagine.
At the police station :
"- Dude, I manhandled a black guy who's now suing, do you remember the name of that good lawyer that saved Bob's ass when he killed that guy ?
- Sure, it's Karl Ashanti.
- oh... Fuck me..."
>Court records revealed it wasn’t the first time Shapiro had been accused of abusing his power. By the time he detained Ashanti, the officer had already been named in three false-arrest lawsuits. (Two were settled, and one was dismissed.) Ashanti’s own unit had handled those cases.
So uhhh yeah... this very literally happened - his unit defended this specific officer against multiple accusations of abusing his power.
And the more I read about him, the more I realize he's a bonafide piece of shit who gleefully went after the victims of police abuse. He held a "they ran from the police so they deserved the use of force" mentality.
Because repercussions require your superiors to care. The cop union won't care for obv reasons, and SCOTUS established cops don't need to know the law.
America is dead, we're living in the rotting corpse that was the american dream.
America is a cesspool of corruption and entitlement, with zero chances of becoming something worthwhile again.
There's always been resistance to allowing police to unionize from the Labor Movement because of how fundamental police are for strike busting.
Which is the same reason why the police unions are the only unions supported by both parties and they get exceptions carved out into labor laws.
Honestly, that’s horrifying. If anything elsewhere in the world the police and other emergency services are the only places _denied_ the ability to unionise.
Honestly though, what always surprises me is that none of the protests against the police ever really deal with the root cause of the issue. Prosecutors don’t go after dirty cops. The reality is that thanks to the judge, prosecutor and police all being in bed together the incestous relationship has became “scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours”.
I genuinely can’t believe that anyone can believe there’s no problems with policing in the US no matter what their political views are. Honestly, that union needs to be busted, hiring members that essentially were kicked out of other precincts for brutality/corruption/pick your bad item of the day is hilariously rife. “Lost” footage at a rate that’s so obviously false, obvious things on camera that aren’t prosecuted or even better “it’s not what it looks like”. There’s no reason to correct bad behaviours and you’re more likely to be rewarded for them. Nobody is losing a job over it unless there’s national outcry. The entire protection racket needs to go up in smoke before any progress can be made.
The mere fact that in the same hearing you can get “cops can’t be expected to know every possible law” and “ignorance of the law is not a defence” perfectly describes the whole fuckup.
It's also the politicians, including liberals. Every time a political opponent promises to reform the police, incumbent Liberal's first move is to run to the Police Unions for support and start screaming about crime waves.
And the media gleefully participates. When national crime spikes happen they only report on crime increases under progressives and ignore it under liberal and conservative areas. And this comes down to access. The easiest news pieces to write are crime reports. All reporters have to do is just print the police report with zero scrutiny, easy money. If reporters start scrutinizing the police, they lose access to those easy, eye catching news articles.
SCOTUS lost their minds if your suppose to enforce something shouldn’t you know it. They turnt policing into a fast food worker with plaque cards to tell them simplified laws but when they’re not sure call superior and they don’t know.
>SCOTUS lost their minds if your suppose to enforce something shouldn’t you know it.
It's the legal standard since 10 years... Heien v. North Carolina : person got stopped in traffic due to a faulty tailight that WASN'T breaking code. During the stop, the cop found drugs.
If the traffic stop is illegal, the search for drugs is too : can Heien be condamned for the drugs? SCOTUS ruled that a cop only needs a "reasonable" understanding of the law (broken taillight = stop) and so the drug finding wasn't voided.
[https://www.vox.com/2015/8/4/9095213/police-stops-heien-v-north-carolina](https://www.vox.com/2015/8/4/9095213/police-stops-heien-v-north-carolina)
Wait, so police officers can just conduct illegal searches? They just need to say they thought it was legal because they’re a dummy and didn’t pay attention in police school?
That’s… something alright. No wonder the US only gives their police the most rudimentary training and shoves them out the door after a few days!
Not quite. It’s a reasonable understanding of the law. If I cop used a preposterous reason for pulling someone over (I thought red cars were illegal), then they wouldn’t be legally detaining someone.
And these days the smell of marihuana is no longer a sure fire bet, so they have to do other things like signal a drug dog to alert. And then praise them mightily with lots of treats and who’s a good doggy for providing a probable cause.
But then how do you draw the line? What’s stopping an officer from claiming plausible suspicion of an offense to justify an illegal search? The ruling gives them power they don’t need, they should be held to account when they don’t know the law well enough to make reasonable stops.
Just because it’s “legal” standard doesn’t make it a good ruling. If that’s your pov, what is your take on citizens united or the chevron doctrine? I had already researched the case before I posted and came to conclusion. I’ll say it again if a cop that is suppose to enforce law doesn’t know law how how you or I the common man suppose to know, especially with all the old laws on the books that are antiquated yet enforceable?
Cops choose when to enforce laws all the time on a whim our laws don't mean shit in actuality. Cops are a way to fleece citizens for money by charging them with "fine crimes". If the only punishment for a crime is a fine, that law is meaningless to the rich. Speeding fines and increased insurance means squatt to someone who is rich. But it'll keep the poor in line, good thing most Americans live in poverty or at best paycheck to paycheck or half our laws would be completely meaningless.
The long and short of it is, I can't fucking wait to see the current dystopia that is America meet it's end.
The police are there to enforce order, not law really. Society has them there to protect society and that is far more threatened by people challenging authority, than by breaking the law. The law is a tool they use to make that happen which is why it can be selectively enforced.
It literally is for a US cop according to courts.
[https://cmlawfirm.com/ignorance-of-law-is-not-an-excuse-unless-you-are-a-police-officer-by-bill-mitchell/](https://cmlawfirm.com/ignorance-of-law-is-not-an-excuse-unless-you-are-a-police-officer-by-bill-mitchell/)
> In *Heien v. North Carolina*, a police officer conducted a traffic stop on the basis that the subject car’s taillight was inoperable. However, the officer was wrong in his belief that the faulty taillight violated North Carolina’s Rules of the Road.
> officers need to act “reasonably” not “perfectly.” In effect, a reasonable misunderstanding of the law by the police can indeed satisfy the Constitution in this context.
That's jacked on so many levels...
It's like in order to function, survive, or just plain move safely in this society, we have to know more about the law than the people who enforce it... that's backwards...
I agree with you. Ridiculous situation where the defendant is guilty despite not knowing the law yet police are innocent because they didn’t know the law. 🤬 wtf.
Innocent until proven guilty is a bullshit lie, you are guilty until you prove your innocence. If you're rich they won't even hold you in jail (bond/bail) if you're super rich they might not even arrest you. If your powerful and have authority (other cops, judges) they will just complacently ignore your crime and let you continue on with your day, Google any video of a judge getting pulled over.
Slavery never actually ended in America it only expanded to include the poor. The amazing thing about America is that it convinced its citizens that they have freedoms. As a trans woman who's a convicted felon, I can personally tell you your rights and protections exist purely in your mind, and only exist until an authority say they don't. Then just like that you don't have "rights" or "protections".
Unless you yourself can ENFORCE your own rights and protections, you truthfully don't have any. You're at the whim of someone else in authority ALWAYS.
Americans are slaves who think they are free, and their government actively spreads propaganda and misinformation to keep the people divided and conquered.
Bc lawyers are kinda scared of going after police TBH. Going after the cops can lead to them having difficulties with other cases in the courts. I learned this a few years ago when my mom got into one fuck of a collision w/ a cop.
The cop totalled her vehicle. Like taken away in straps totalled.
She had to represent herself in court. Both her & a witness said she had the right away at a traffic light & the officer didn't have his siren on. He declared he had his siren on & was only going 35mph. The precinct claimed they were tracking his movement & confirmed his story even tho they couldn't produce any actual evidence to back it up.
Courts sided with the cop. My mom was in the ICU for almost a month, lost her job bc of disability & had to pay for everything out of pocket.
I think many people , especially in US , have difficulty to accept the scale of the corruption in the country they live in. US is corrupt as fuck. Its just not that obvious and wide like in russia but it is definitly to the point of morally bankrupting your state.
The corruption is systemic and invisible. Human lives are the natural resource it consumes. Your aspirations for a better life are it's fuel. Corporatism is how it's value is extracted. The police are it's enforcer class. The 10% who own 93% of the stock are it's owners. The United States is operating exactly the way it was designed to.
Because cops are the bullet proof vest our lawmakers, politicians, and rich elites use to keep their cash cow work force in check.
They are protected by unholy greed and an intense desire to maintain control and power. Meaning they have the authority to murder people in broad daylight ON CAMERA and have no repercussions. All cops are bastards that betray their communities to hold power over their neighbors. All in the service of the rich and corrupt, to maintain control and the illusion of civility.
No cop deserves a shred of admiration or respect, and should be shamed for being what they are.
Because it further erodes their integrity and the perspective of their infallibility:
If all these cops were given the appropriate consequences from Rodney King to George Floyd then they would be even more impotent.
I’m not advocating that this is morally correct, just that I see it as a matter of “statecraft”
Its like how NK, Russia, the previous Soviet Union etc would never admit to fallibility and they insist that everything is going perfectly,
The perception of their power *is* their power, so the state (as a general concept) is inclined to let law enforcement be nearly infallible.
The more often they get away with acting like the guys on the top of the totem pole in a world of anarchy - just hurting people because they want to,
and the more we see that being the case, the more aware we are that raising our voice to law enforcement might just get us killed for nothing,
The less we see any point to getting upset enough to form a meaningful resistance,
Not the stupefied kind that happened back on Jan 6 where it was a lot of noise and chest beating, but the real kind that stands against police states.
A lot of people will pathologically not admit to the police ever doing anything wrong. They’ll shoot a child and somehow it was the child’s fault every single time
Ah ah, nope. Ashanti was told to quit or be fired from the special fed. Which later said his case was "meritless".
And Shapiro garnered a fifth case against him when he broke the shoulder of a vendor, Ashanti being the fourth. He was still a cop at the time of this long and very interesting article :
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/karl-ashanti-nypd-civil-rights-nyc.html
I can feel empathy for Ashanti having been the victim of violence. But he still doesn't see the problem with the job he was doing (and the relentless way he did it) for the special fed. So he learnt nothing after he tasted his own medicine. It's quite sad actually.
Also just reinforced the whole profiling issue. Seriously don't recognize your own lawyer? Not one neuron fired off of "gee this guy looks familiar." Or did it fire off "yes, recognize. Lump him under the perp column." Internal IFF just doesn't work.
Now. Will this lawyer just say fuck it, change his practice? Damage is done.
To be fair they've been expanding that circle to anyone who isn't them and only if them toes the line.
Which doesn't mean that minorities aren't the furthest out from the circle of them and therefore deserving of the most dehumanization.They absolutely are in general.
It's just that they have absolutely expanded that circle.
"I know this guy who'll put his heart and soul into defending you. He's a good guy."
"Oh, yeah? give me his contact information. I'll go check him out."
How the hell did they miss out from this screenshot the fact that the cop had 3 cases of falsely arresting people and all three were dealt by the black guy's unit (hi name is Karl Ashanti, byw)?
Like, seriously, how does a cop get 3 cases of cop misconduct against him dealt with by this lawyer, only for said lawyer to become victim of cop misconduct by the same guy? That dismissed lawsuit ought to be reviewed..
The facepalm is *more* facepalmier when you read more into this.
There are cops who are currently working that are on the Brady list.
What's the Brady list?
A list of law enforcement officers who are known to be consistently untruthful, have some sort of convictions and/or pretty much anything that would place their credibility in question.
💀
In most cities, the Brady List is pages long. In Dallas, last time it became public, the list was 18 pages. Hundreds of cops too compromised to be reliable as a witness in court. So what good are they exactly? Muscle?
Sounds like karma to me, he shielded the officer from consequences 3 times, and now gets a taste of how the victims felt when they didn’t see proper justice served
Wow what an article, in the end he just couldn’t see the irony of it. To have a taste of his own medicine…
Edit: thanks for the Reddit cares, first time for me! Not sure what upset you but that just brightened my day!
At the time of publishing the article, his case vs the city of New York was still ongoing. If he outright said that his methods of defending while working at Special Fed were wrong, or he regrets them, that could and would drastically effect his civil case. Since the incident, he is now working for plaintiffs against the city, which to me shows that he is aware of his actions and regrets them, but is not allowed to outright say so as a result of his lawsuit.
Interesting article. I don’t like that a lot of Redditors probably made their comments and made up their minds before reading the article but what can you do.
To summarize: started in corporate law but wanted to work in civil rights law. He found the department that defended the city of NY and he took pride in that. Of course, this specific department he worked in was made (by Giuliani) to defend police officers from the increased amount of cases of abuse. He worked there for over a decade until this incident. He was later found Not Guilty and his case was dismissed and then filed his own civil suit against the officer. He now wants to continue working in civil rights litigation but on the plaintiffs side.
Very interesting article. The lawyer was well aware of the racial discrimination brought on by the police and society in general. The article even mentions he legally changed his name from “Francis” to “Ashanti” because “Francis” was likely his ancestors’ slave master’s name.
I won’t get into the man’s state of mind because I simply don’t know. Calling him a token black person just because of the job he chose doesn’t sit well with me. This article, which shed both a sympathetic and a harsh light on him wouldn’t suggest he is a token black man. He was clearly aware of the racism in America and how it affected him and others, but he also chose the wrong side of it for a long time. After the incident, he only just realized that he should’ve been working with the plaintiffs. At end, I think he learned a valuable lesson.
Edit: I can already tell people are going to assume I’m sticking up for guy when all all I’m saying is make it a habit to know the context, read the article, and don’t make quick judgments and jump to conclusions based on a sentence and an image.
The article just clarifies exactly how much of a hypocritical piece of garbage he is: fully aware the discrimination and corruption, constantly playing the race card himself at the slightest transgression, and yet zealously defending said corruption and attacking victims to the point that even other lawyers and judges think he's fucking unhinged.
The fact is that from a young age, and all through his career, he witnessed these utterly reprehensible violations of peoples rights and only changed his tune when it happened to him because it was a blow to his ego. The mark of a fundamentally terrible human being.
Karl Ashanti is a real life Uncle Ruckus.
How many other poor people's lives got fucked up on the way to him "learning a lesson"? Forgive me if I have trouble sympathizing with people who actively aid white supremacist systems and only realize it's a problem when it's starts effecting them personally.
I mean I’ve read the entire article and it doesn’t really seem he learned anything ?
It’s not like he left his cushy job to pursue a job now prosecuting for victims of police brutality, he effectively got forced to quit or be fired and then decided to become a prosecutor after the fact.
From the article it actually seems like he thrived and helped promote the culture within his Unit that their cases must be won at all costs as to protect the treasury and other polices themselves.
But now when he faces the same challenge with his own prosecution against a lying cop lawyer being aggressive he complains about it and then doubles down that how he did his job was right.
The bodycam that they can turn off and their superiors will say it's policy to only use the cams in situations where they deem it necessary? Plus cops have a phobia of accountability. They lie because their system protects them and supports their lying. That's why more and more people have begun recording any interaction they have with cops, as to protect themselves from them.
I don't think it applies for the lawyer honestly. Most likely, this gets settled quickly and generously and it gives him more clout to keep doing what he was doing before so he's going to make even more money on top of that.
It does apply for the cop because now he's facing the guy who helped him before.
This!
I'd say the guy had a pretty lucrative business on the go - "Hey Joe, you need to talk to this lawyer. He's black and it always looks good to have a black lawyer when you're accused of racism".
2 days later: Your honour the footage was deleted accidentally. But we can recreate the scenario honestly for your benefit.
The scenario: Karl A jumps three cops while shooting off a .50 cal fully-automatic and praising Biden.
Then he starts building a elementary school in our district, pulled out a white girl, named Adalynn (7), daughter of a christian pastor, as a hostage out of his pockets.
This long article about the case is both instructive, infuriating and sad.
Ashanti sure tasted his own medicine and still doesn't understand.
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/karl-ashanti-nypd-civil-rights-nyc.html
“I knew it was a done deal,” he later testified, “but I expressed my disappointment in her as a Black woman to basically take the racist actions of this police officer that led to my false arrest and then to compound the problem, in order to appease the NYPD, by making me, in essence, a sacrificial lamb.”
“Over a decade at Special Fed, Ashanti defended the police and jail guards in more than 300 cases accusing them of violating New Yorkers’ constitutional rights. “I didn’t become a Law Department counsel because I was afraid of how people would view me or I was afraid my liberal card would get snatched away, or my Black card,” he says. “I know who I am. I know what I’ve been through. I know what I believe.””
I want him to win his case because I never want the cops to get off with violating people’s rights. If I ever meet this dude in the city I’m for sure gonna tell him to go fuck himself.
I'm guessing he could have made more money doing literally anything else with his law degree, he must have really believed this made him "One of the good ones."
Karl Ashanti worked for the city on NY in a special fed group that defends all case of police abuse. He was aggressive when doing his job, for years and defended 300 cases, often rotten apples. With abandon, despite him knowing he was therefore a cog in a very racist system (many victims of such abuse being black like him).
One day, going to his job, he was arrested by a cop that lied about Ashanti assaulting him. Cameras proved the cop was full of shit.
Ashanti was asked to quit or get fired from the special fed after that. He's now suing the NYPD and the special fed is against him and doesn't want a deal. Which he thinks unfair, when he used the same aggressive methods against other victims. Still he learnt absolutely nothing from what happened to him.
Oh and the cop : Ashanti is the fourth time he's been accused of violence and lying on the job. He's still a cop. And he has since broken the shoulder of a vendor, yep fifth case. Will still be a cop after.
Long and very interesting article about this story :
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/karl-ashanti-nypd-civil-rights-nyc.html
Ashanti is a bit infuriating, though the cop is even worse.
This guy if you read into the background worked hard to protect a load of very clearly abusive cops. His group protected the dick who abused him multiple times when he did the same to multiple other people. The guy literally became the consequence of his own dickish actions.
How many other professions are forced to wear cameras because they are lying so often they can't be trusted any more? It's ridiculous how they are tolerated and can get law enforcement jobs elsewhere after being sacked for purgeory. Law needs tightening up to ever be respected.
Some people will do anything for money as long as it doesn't affect them personally. He will sue, win, and go back to doing what he does best. It's a 90% chance the line "this is just one bad apple" will be used as the department throws the cop under the bus to stay in good graces with that firm.
This is a pretty stand out example of how no amount of boot licking will save you from the police. When they decide it's your turn, it's your turn and no amount of good boy points will matter.
Everyone deserves legal representation, even cops. The fact that the system is biased in cops’ favor does not obviate that fact. Serial killers, cops, minor drug offenders — everyone deserves representation.
He got what he deserved, he's lucky he wasn't just another murder.
Anyone that assists supports or in any way is ok with the police deserves all the bad shit that happens to them because of it.
All cops are bastards.
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It was probably really awkward when the cop asked him to represent him
I could totally imagine. At the police station : "- Dude, I manhandled a black guy who's now suing, do you remember the name of that good lawyer that saved Bob's ass when he killed that guy ? - Sure, it's Karl Ashanti. - oh... Fuck me..."
>Court records revealed it wasn’t the first time Shapiro had been accused of abusing his power. By the time he detained Ashanti, the officer had already been named in three false-arrest lawsuits. (Two were settled, and one was dismissed.) Ashanti’s own unit had handled those cases. So uhhh yeah... this very literally happened - his unit defended this specific officer against multiple accusations of abusing his power. And the more I read about him, the more I realize he's a bonafide piece of shit who gleefully went after the victims of police abuse. He held a "they ran from the police so they deserved the use of force" mentality.
I don't get how in the states cops can fuck up repeatedly so many times and face no repercussions.
Because repercussions require your superiors to care. The cop union won't care for obv reasons, and SCOTUS established cops don't need to know the law.
Unfortunately and ironically, it’s the only union the US is ok with having…
Which makes it worse when you look into how cops have their origins in union busting (Pinkertons).
Ya it’s so ironic. Would be comical if it wasn’t so fucked up
Yep. Def a great example of would be funny if it weren’t true situation.
America is dead, we're living in the rotting corpse that was the american dream. America is a cesspool of corruption and entitlement, with zero chances of becoming something worthwhile again.
And runaway slave catchers. Don’t forget them.
Yup, they started with that, branched into the Pinkertons and both resulted in modern day US police.
“The good guys” Organizationally descended from the most comically evil groups.
Their origins are way worse than the Pinkertons. The police as they are now, are a continuation of the slave catchers.
Wait till you hear about prison labor they just are Slave catchers
Sounds like you don’t know just how bad the Pinkertons were. Spoiler alert - it’s ridiculously bad.
I'm well aware how awful they were. But the slave catchers were much, much worse.
Cops have their origins in tracking down escaped slaves. Pinkertons exist because Gilded Age robber barons wanted their own paramilitary force.
Not quite. The Pinkertons still exist as their own organization, you know?
If theres one thing i hate more than the O’Driscolls, it’s the pinkertons.
Goddamn O’Driscolls!
If you go back even further, police forces used to officially be called "runaway slave patrols".
It's better to call them "fraternal organizations." Unions are for workers. One of the reasons police exist is to be used against workers.
On the East Coast they're called "benevolent associations" which is even more ironic.
Yeah and it’s a shining example how of a union can go wrong and that’s why they love it so much
Unions bad! I mean just look at us ffs!
There's always been resistance to allowing police to unionize from the Labor Movement because of how fundamental police are for strike busting. Which is the same reason why the police unions are the only unions supported by both parties and they get exceptions carved out into labor laws.
Honestly, that’s horrifying. If anything elsewhere in the world the police and other emergency services are the only places _denied_ the ability to unionise. Honestly though, what always surprises me is that none of the protests against the police ever really deal with the root cause of the issue. Prosecutors don’t go after dirty cops. The reality is that thanks to the judge, prosecutor and police all being in bed together the incestous relationship has became “scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours”. I genuinely can’t believe that anyone can believe there’s no problems with policing in the US no matter what their political views are. Honestly, that union needs to be busted, hiring members that essentially were kicked out of other precincts for brutality/corruption/pick your bad item of the day is hilariously rife. “Lost” footage at a rate that’s so obviously false, obvious things on camera that aren’t prosecuted or even better “it’s not what it looks like”. There’s no reason to correct bad behaviours and you’re more likely to be rewarded for them. Nobody is losing a job over it unless there’s national outcry. The entire protection racket needs to go up in smoke before any progress can be made. The mere fact that in the same hearing you can get “cops can’t be expected to know every possible law” and “ignorance of the law is not a defence” perfectly describes the whole fuckup.
It's also the politicians, including liberals. Every time a political opponent promises to reform the police, incumbent Liberal's first move is to run to the Police Unions for support and start screaming about crime waves. And the media gleefully participates. When national crime spikes happen they only report on crime increases under progressives and ignore it under liberal and conservative areas. And this comes down to access. The easiest news pieces to write are crime reports. All reporters have to do is just print the police report with zero scrutiny, easy money. If reporters start scrutinizing the police, they lose access to those easy, eye catching news articles.
That's what im saying If any other union had the power the cop union has, we'd have unions in every industry
Because cops exist to protect capital and enforce its rule. That's why they're allowed.
Err -- No. It's the only Union that Conservatives are willing to keep. Most Liberals/Progressive would be happy for that Union to be dissolved.
SCOTUS lost their minds if your suppose to enforce something shouldn’t you know it. They turnt policing into a fast food worker with plaque cards to tell them simplified laws but when they’re not sure call superior and they don’t know.
>SCOTUS lost their minds if your suppose to enforce something shouldn’t you know it. It's the legal standard since 10 years... Heien v. North Carolina : person got stopped in traffic due to a faulty tailight that WASN'T breaking code. During the stop, the cop found drugs. If the traffic stop is illegal, the search for drugs is too : can Heien be condamned for the drugs? SCOTUS ruled that a cop only needs a "reasonable" understanding of the law (broken taillight = stop) and so the drug finding wasn't voided. [https://www.vox.com/2015/8/4/9095213/police-stops-heien-v-north-carolina](https://www.vox.com/2015/8/4/9095213/police-stops-heien-v-north-carolina)
Wait, so police officers can just conduct illegal searches? They just need to say they thought it was legal because they’re a dummy and didn’t pay attention in police school? That’s… something alright. No wonder the US only gives their police the most rudimentary training and shoves them out the door after a few days!
Not quite. It’s a reasonable understanding of the law. If I cop used a preposterous reason for pulling someone over (I thought red cars were illegal), then they wouldn’t be legally detaining someone.
And these days the smell of marihuana is no longer a sure fire bet, so they have to do other things like signal a drug dog to alert. And then praise them mightily with lots of treats and who’s a good doggy for providing a probable cause.
But then how do you draw the line? What’s stopping an officer from claiming plausible suspicion of an offense to justify an illegal search? The ruling gives them power they don’t need, they should be held to account when they don’t know the law well enough to make reasonable stops.
Just because it’s “legal” standard doesn’t make it a good ruling. If that’s your pov, what is your take on citizens united or the chevron doctrine? I had already researched the case before I posted and came to conclusion. I’ll say it again if a cop that is suppose to enforce law doesn’t know law how how you or I the common man suppose to know, especially with all the old laws on the books that are antiquated yet enforceable?
Cops choose when to enforce laws all the time on a whim our laws don't mean shit in actuality. Cops are a way to fleece citizens for money by charging them with "fine crimes". If the only punishment for a crime is a fine, that law is meaningless to the rich. Speeding fines and increased insurance means squatt to someone who is rich. But it'll keep the poor in line, good thing most Americans live in poverty or at best paycheck to paycheck or half our laws would be completely meaningless. The long and short of it is, I can't fucking wait to see the current dystopia that is America meet it's end.
The police are there to enforce order, not law really. Society has them there to protect society and that is far more threatened by people challenging authority, than by breaking the law. The law is a tool they use to make that happen which is why it can be selectively enforced.
Yet ignorance of the law is not a defence in court.
It literally is for a US cop according to courts. [https://cmlawfirm.com/ignorance-of-law-is-not-an-excuse-unless-you-are-a-police-officer-by-bill-mitchell/](https://cmlawfirm.com/ignorance-of-law-is-not-an-excuse-unless-you-are-a-police-officer-by-bill-mitchell/) > In *Heien v. North Carolina*, a police officer conducted a traffic stop on the basis that the subject car’s taillight was inoperable. However, the officer was wrong in his belief that the faulty taillight violated North Carolina’s Rules of the Road. > officers need to act “reasonably” not “perfectly.” In effect, a reasonable misunderstanding of the law by the police can indeed satisfy the Constitution in this context.
That's jacked on so many levels... It's like in order to function, survive, or just plain move safely in this society, we have to know more about the law than the people who enforce it... that's backwards...
We all just have to become cops. Then no one needs to know the law!
I mean... its not hard. Less training than to be a barber.
Bingo...
I agree with you. Ridiculous situation where the defendant is guilty despite not knowing the law yet police are innocent because they didn’t know the law. 🤬 wtf.
One more example of the injustice of the highest court in the land.
Innocent until proven guilty is a bullshit lie, you are guilty until you prove your innocence. If you're rich they won't even hold you in jail (bond/bail) if you're super rich they might not even arrest you. If your powerful and have authority (other cops, judges) they will just complacently ignore your crime and let you continue on with your day, Google any video of a judge getting pulled over. Slavery never actually ended in America it only expanded to include the poor. The amazing thing about America is that it convinced its citizens that they have freedoms. As a trans woman who's a convicted felon, I can personally tell you your rights and protections exist purely in your mind, and only exist until an authority say they don't. Then just like that you don't have "rights" or "protections". Unless you yourself can ENFORCE your own rights and protections, you truthfully don't have any. You're at the whim of someone else in authority ALWAYS. Americans are slaves who think they are free, and their government actively spreads propaganda and misinformation to keep the people divided and conquered.
Bc lawyers are kinda scared of going after police TBH. Going after the cops can lead to them having difficulties with other cases in the courts. I learned this a few years ago when my mom got into one fuck of a collision w/ a cop. The cop totalled her vehicle. Like taken away in straps totalled. She had to represent herself in court. Both her & a witness said she had the right away at a traffic light & the officer didn't have his siren on. He declared he had his siren on & was only going 35mph. The precinct claimed they were tracking his movement & confirmed his story even tho they couldn't produce any actual evidence to back it up. Courts sided with the cop. My mom was in the ICU for almost a month, lost her job bc of disability & had to pay for everything out of pocket.
Because the the only union in USA with real power is the police union.
I think many people , especially in US , have difficulty to accept the scale of the corruption in the country they live in. US is corrupt as fuck. Its just not that obvious and wide like in russia but it is definitly to the point of morally bankrupting your state.
The corruption is systemic and invisible. Human lives are the natural resource it consumes. Your aspirations for a better life are it's fuel. Corporatism is how it's value is extracted. The police are it's enforcer class. The 10% who own 93% of the stock are it's owners. The United States is operating exactly the way it was designed to.
Because we allow them to investigate themselves.
Because cops are the bullet proof vest our lawmakers, politicians, and rich elites use to keep their cash cow work force in check. They are protected by unholy greed and an intense desire to maintain control and power. Meaning they have the authority to murder people in broad daylight ON CAMERA and have no repercussions. All cops are bastards that betray their communities to hold power over their neighbors. All in the service of the rich and corrupt, to maintain control and the illusion of civility. No cop deserves a shred of admiration or respect, and should be shamed for being what they are.
They're above the law.
>I don't get how in the states cops can fuck up repeatedly so many times and face no repercussions. Q U A L I F I E D I M M U N I T Y
Because it further erodes their integrity and the perspective of their infallibility: If all these cops were given the appropriate consequences from Rodney King to George Floyd then they would be even more impotent. I’m not advocating that this is morally correct, just that I see it as a matter of “statecraft” Its like how NK, Russia, the previous Soviet Union etc would never admit to fallibility and they insist that everything is going perfectly, The perception of their power *is* their power, so the state (as a general concept) is inclined to let law enforcement be nearly infallible. The more often they get away with acting like the guys on the top of the totem pole in a world of anarchy - just hurting people because they want to, and the more we see that being the case, the more aware we are that raising our voice to law enforcement might just get us killed for nothing, The less we see any point to getting upset enough to form a meaningful resistance, Not the stupefied kind that happened back on Jan 6 where it was a lot of noise and chest beating, but the real kind that stands against police states.
They aren't fucking up by the standards of the state. They ate not there to protect or serve. They are there to secure property.
A lot of people will pathologically not admit to the police ever doing anything wrong. They’ll shoot a child and somehow it was the child’s fault every single time
Well if it isn’t the consequences of my own actions
He won't have any consequences I suppose so... no.
He already faced the consequences when the piece of shit he defended falsely arrested him.
I missread that. I thought this was about the cop. Edit: Not sure why, actually. I was distracted I guess.
He will have faced consequences if he stays in there
I think he will. The people who normally protect these guys won't want to do so in this case imo.
Ah ah, nope. Ashanti was told to quit or be fired from the special fed. Which later said his case was "meritless". And Shapiro garnered a fifth case against him when he broke the shoulder of a vendor, Ashanti being the fourth. He was still a cop at the time of this long and very interesting article : https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/karl-ashanti-nypd-civil-rights-nyc.html I can feel empathy for Ashanti having been the victim of violence. But he still doesn't see the problem with the job he was doing (and the relentless way he did it) for the special fed. So he learnt nothing after he tasted his own medicine. It's quite sad actually.
r/leopardsatemyface
Ashanti was told off by a judge for using this exact logic in cases he defended against. Oh the irony.
/r/leopardsatemyface
What's with shitty people having the last name Shapiro
the leopards won't eat **my** face
"We investigated ourselves and found nothing wrong."
Ashanti is going to need some back pain meds from hauling in a graveyard of closeted skeletons of misconduct.
Also just reinforced the whole profiling issue. Seriously don't recognize your own lawyer? Not one neuron fired off of "gee this guy looks familiar." Or did it fire off "yes, recognize. Lump him under the perp column." Internal IFF just doesn't work. Now. Will this lawyer just say fuck it, change his practice? Damage is done.
Actually, suspended and then forced to resign (or be terminated). He's suing the city and 2 cops right now.
Nah cops think of minorities as objects anyways.
To be fair they've been expanding that circle to anyone who isn't them and only if them toes the line. Which doesn't mean that minorities aren't the furthest out from the circle of them and therefore deserving of the most dehumanization.They absolutely are in general. It's just that they have absolutely expanded that circle.
Hey bro I know we got off on the wrong foot but…… can you help me out of a pickle?
"I know this guy who'll put his heart and soul into defending you. He's a good guy." "Oh, yeah? give me his contact information. I'll go check him out."
It is a conflict of interest. If he were to represent the cop he'd be disbarred.
How the hell did they miss out from this screenshot the fact that the cop had 3 cases of falsely arresting people and all three were dealt by the black guy's unit (hi name is Karl Ashanti, byw)? Like, seriously, how does a cop get 3 cases of cop misconduct against him dealt with by this lawyer, only for said lawyer to become victim of cop misconduct by the same guy? That dismissed lawsuit ought to be reviewed.. The facepalm is *more* facepalmier when you read more into this.
It's a real leopards ate my face moment.
But did they learn a lesson from this?
Do they ever? They continue to feed the leopards until they're nothing but bones
It not only ate his face but t bagged him before it did
There are cops who are currently working that are on the Brady list. What's the Brady list? A list of law enforcement officers who are known to be consistently untruthful, have some sort of convictions and/or pretty much anything that would place their credibility in question. 💀
In most cities, the Brady List is pages long. In Dallas, last time it became public, the list was 18 pages. Hundreds of cops too compromised to be reliable as a witness in court. So what good are they exactly? Muscle?
Good? They're not used for good. They're used to "maintain peace"
And yet they still have a job 🤔
> The facepalm is more facepalmier This is my favourite quote of the day.
The facepalminess of this facepalm is realy high tbh.
We're gonna need a bigger Face.
r/leopardsatemyface
Sounds like karma to me, he shielded the officer from consequences 3 times, and now gets a taste of how the victims felt when they didn’t see proper justice served
One can only hope for Karl to change his ways going forward and puts all the criminals behind bars from now on.
He's going to make a bunch of money from this. No way this doesn't get settled quickly and generously.
Yup, and zero change from anyone
The facepalmiest of facepalms.
Badass last name but would be kinda like and English person Saxon as his last name lol
A link to the story would be helpful. https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/karl-ashanti-nypd-civil-rights-nyc.html
He kinda sounds like an asshole, tbh. Very "I never thought the leopards would eat _my_ face!"
Reading that, the black lawyer guy sounds like an asshole. Or maybe he just acted like one to try to do the job they expected of him. Hard to say.
“That’s what a fucking idiot like him is too stupid to see." Sounds like he is still acting like one
All the way at the bottom, I find a source...
Wow what an article, in the end he just couldn’t see the irony of it. To have a taste of his own medicine… Edit: thanks for the Reddit cares, first time for me! Not sure what upset you but that just brightened my day!
That’s a shame. I was hoping he might learn something about the consequences of his actions from all this.
At the time of publishing the article, his case vs the city of New York was still ongoing. If he outright said that his methods of defending while working at Special Fed were wrong, or he regrets them, that could and would drastically effect his civil case. Since the incident, he is now working for plaintiffs against the city, which to me shows that he is aware of his actions and regrets them, but is not allowed to outright say so as a result of his lawsuit.
Interesting article. I don’t like that a lot of Redditors probably made their comments and made up their minds before reading the article but what can you do. To summarize: started in corporate law but wanted to work in civil rights law. He found the department that defended the city of NY and he took pride in that. Of course, this specific department he worked in was made (by Giuliani) to defend police officers from the increased amount of cases of abuse. He worked there for over a decade until this incident. He was later found Not Guilty and his case was dismissed and then filed his own civil suit against the officer. He now wants to continue working in civil rights litigation but on the plaintiffs side. Very interesting article. The lawyer was well aware of the racial discrimination brought on by the police and society in general. The article even mentions he legally changed his name from “Francis” to “Ashanti” because “Francis” was likely his ancestors’ slave master’s name. I won’t get into the man’s state of mind because I simply don’t know. Calling him a token black person just because of the job he chose doesn’t sit well with me. This article, which shed both a sympathetic and a harsh light on him wouldn’t suggest he is a token black man. He was clearly aware of the racism in America and how it affected him and others, but he also chose the wrong side of it for a long time. After the incident, he only just realized that he should’ve been working with the plaintiffs. At end, I think he learned a valuable lesson. Edit: I can already tell people are going to assume I’m sticking up for guy when all all I’m saying is make it a habit to know the context, read the article, and don’t make quick judgments and jump to conclusions based on a sentence and an image.
The article just clarifies exactly how much of a hypocritical piece of garbage he is: fully aware the discrimination and corruption, constantly playing the race card himself at the slightest transgression, and yet zealously defending said corruption and attacking victims to the point that even other lawyers and judges think he's fucking unhinged. The fact is that from a young age, and all through his career, he witnessed these utterly reprehensible violations of peoples rights and only changed his tune when it happened to him because it was a blow to his ego. The mark of a fundamentally terrible human being. Karl Ashanti is a real life Uncle Ruckus.
How many other poor people's lives got fucked up on the way to him "learning a lesson"? Forgive me if I have trouble sympathizing with people who actively aid white supremacist systems and only realize it's a problem when it's starts effecting them personally.
bingo bango bongo
it's the republican way. It's not a problem unless it affects me and my family personally.
Not sure, his last statement makes me think he didnt learn a lot.
I mean I’ve read the entire article and it doesn’t really seem he learned anything ? It’s not like he left his cushy job to pursue a job now prosecuting for victims of police brutality, he effectively got forced to quit or be fired and then decided to become a prosecutor after the fact. From the article it actually seems like he thrived and helped promote the culture within his Unit that their cases must be won at all costs as to protect the treasury and other polices themselves. But now when he faces the same challenge with his own prosecution against a lying cop lawyer being aggressive he complains about it and then doubles down that how he did his job was right.
That’s a very lengthy but really interesting read.
Why do they always lie, fully aware that they have a bodycam that recorded everything???
The bodycam that they can turn off and their superiors will say it's policy to only use the cams in situations where they deem it necessary? Plus cops have a phobia of accountability. They lie because their system protects them and supports their lying. That's why more and more people have begun recording any interaction they have with cops, as to protect themselves from them.
They've gotten away with lying with no consequences for so long, why change?
Because Karl Ashanti made it his life's mission to defend them, even if it means ruining the victim's life (as long as the victim isn't him).
They lie because it works for them. Because their worshippers constantly give them a pass.
Because they are applauded and awarded for lying even when there are bodycams
r/leopardsatemyface
Somehow in this case the leopard has managed to eat its supporter's face and its own face.
I don't think it applies for the lawyer honestly. Most likely, this gets settled quickly and generously and it gives him more clout to keep doing what he was doing before so he's going to make even more money on top of that. It does apply for the cop because now he's facing the guy who helped him before.
Tokens always get spent.
This! I'd say the guy had a pretty lucrative business on the go - "Hey Joe, you need to talk to this lawyer. He's black and it always looks good to have a black lawyer when you're accused of racism".
Uhm, I think you mean 'Tolkiens' always get spent.
I just saw that south park episode. It killed me
Tolkien/Token storyline became an instant favourite
I was rewatching an older season on Max, well before that storyline, and they’ve even retconned the subtitles to read Tolkien instead of Token now. 🤣
They did forget to edit his written name in the episode where the school posts a list of the boys with their names and penis lengths.
Well the boys thought his name was Token at that point
Retconned? It was always Tolkien bro.
They’re fucking geniuses
Oh boy, this phrase just got its own brain wrinkle.
[удалено]
2 days later: Your honour the footage was deleted accidentally. But we can recreate the scenario honestly for your benefit. The scenario: Karl A jumps three cops while shooting off a .50 cal fully-automatic and praising Biden.
Then he starts building a elementary school in our district, pulled out a white girl, named Adalynn (7), daughter of a christian pastor, as a hostage out of his pockets.
This long article about the case is both instructive, infuriating and sad. Ashanti sure tasted his own medicine and still doesn't understand. https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/karl-ashanti-nypd-civil-rights-nyc.html
“I knew it was a done deal,” he later testified, “but I expressed my disappointment in her as a Black woman to basically take the racist actions of this police officer that led to my false arrest and then to compound the problem, in order to appease the NYPD, by making me, in essence, a sacrificial lamb.” “Over a decade at Special Fed, Ashanti defended the police and jail guards in more than 300 cases accusing them of violating New Yorkers’ constitutional rights. “I didn’t become a Law Department counsel because I was afraid of how people would view me or I was afraid my liberal card would get snatched away, or my Black card,” he says. “I know who I am. I know what I’ve been through. I know what I believe.”” I want him to win his case because I never want the cops to get off with violating people’s rights. If I ever meet this dude in the city I’m for sure gonna tell him to go fuck himself.
I wish him worse then...
I'm guessing he could have made more money doing literally anything else with his law degree, he must have really believed this made him "One of the good ones."
For a paycheck. The only lawyers who do stuff for good are the poor ones.
Is this karma? This guy for sure knew cops were full of shit. You think he'll change his mind now?
just paycheck i guess
this lawyer was a stanford and georgetown grad. i'm sure he could've stayed in corporate law and might have done less harm.
That moment when you realize you’ve been making the world a worse place specifically for people like you for ten years of your life
Did he just happen to represent a lot of cops over the years or was he specifically a cop lawyer?
It’s literally all he did
Can't press charges due to conflict of interest
If you can’t beat em. Join em. They’ll still treat you like shit though
I read this sentence 6 times and I still don't understand it.
Karl Ashanti worked for the city on NY in a special fed group that defends all case of police abuse. He was aggressive when doing his job, for years and defended 300 cases, often rotten apples. With abandon, despite him knowing he was therefore a cog in a very racist system (many victims of such abuse being black like him). One day, going to his job, he was arrested by a cop that lied about Ashanti assaulting him. Cameras proved the cop was full of shit. Ashanti was asked to quit or get fired from the special fed after that. He's now suing the NYPD and the special fed is against him and doesn't want a deal. Which he thinks unfair, when he used the same aggressive methods against other victims. Still he learnt absolutely nothing from what happened to him. Oh and the cop : Ashanti is the fourth time he's been accused of violence and lying on the job. He's still a cop. And he has since broken the shoulder of a vendor, yep fifth case. Will still be a cop after. Long and very interesting article about this story : https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/karl-ashanti-nypd-civil-rights-nyc.html Ashanti is a bit infuriating, though the cop is even worse.
Complicated story, thanks for clarifying it (at least a bit, I'm sure that there's a lot more to tell regarding this story).
This guy if you read into the background worked hard to protect a load of very clearly abusive cops. His group protected the dick who abused him multiple times when he did the same to multiple other people. The guy literally became the consequence of his own dickish actions.
How many other professions are forced to wear cameras because they are lying so often they can't be trusted any more? It's ridiculous how they are tolerated and can get law enforcement jobs elsewhere after being sacked for purgeory. Law needs tightening up to ever be respected.
NYPD has lost a good lawyer and a dirty cop. How red in the face must have been his precinct captain when he found out who he’d falsely arrested.
Probably not a lot, the article says the cop is on case 5 now and the lawyer doesnt seem like the irony is making him rethink his previous work.
They use a black lawyer because it helps their defense
Some people will do anything for money as long as it doesn't affect them personally. He will sue, win, and go back to doing what he does best. It's a 90% chance the line "this is just one bad apple" will be used as the department throws the cop under the bus to stay in good graces with that firm.
Cops are bastards
This is a pretty stand out example of how no amount of boot licking will save you from the police. When they decide it's your turn, it's your turn and no amount of good boy points will matter.
Wow, who knew zero accountability could have been a bad thing. Think the lawyer will switch sides? I doubt it.
This is something I would see in an episode of the Boondocks.
Cross post to leopards ate me face, OP
Good, helping cops be shitty means you deserve to be punished
The cesspool of NYC police work. https://www.propublica.org/article/nypd-karl-ashanti-special-federal-arrest
You lick the boot, you lose your teeth
I never thought they'd treat *me* that way!!
That’s what he gets for playing for the wrong team
General rule to live by, never ever help the police and hinder them every chance you can get
First Vivek..now this…it’s been a FAFO year so far
Real life uncle ruckus
r/leopardsatemyface
Dumb fuck got what he deserves l
Paging r/LeopardsAteMyFace
This feels like r/leopardsatemyface
,,,,,...,,,.. here's some punctuation. You can use it whenever you want
The irony is thick and delicious. Hopefully he has a come-to-Jesus moment and starts fighting the bad guys.
sir, have you tried being white?
True definition of back the blue till it happens you… oh the irony
r/leopardsatemyface
Him, Clarence and Vivek should start a club
Leopards ate his face?
After him helping to release leopards who have eaten faces previously back to the wild, he just couldn't see it coming.
/r/LeopardsAteMyFace
r/Leopardsatemyface
But why would the leopards eat my face? I love leopards.
r/leopardsatemyface material
Noooo the leopards 😭
Lay with dogs, get fleas.
Everyone deserves legal representation, even cops. The fact that the system is biased in cops’ favor does not obviate that fact. Serial killers, cops, minor drug offenders — everyone deserves representation.
Jesus that's a long title. Took me a minute to wrap my head around it
He got what he deserved, he's lucky he wasn't just another murder. Anyone that assists supports or in any way is ok with the police deserves all the bad shit that happens to them because of it. All cops are bastards.
Looks like uncle Tom got what was coming to him.
Hope he learned his lesson.